Michael Noonan (Limerick City, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

If we go back to first principles, there are social and economic reasons for introducing a scheme such as this. The social reasons are to provide extra accommodation or better facilities in the family home for those who need them. The economic reason is to get people back to work. The live register includes a cohort of 80,000 people with skills that are primarily related to the construction industry. I do not believe all the retraining in the world will turn a lot of them into employees who are suitable for the IT or farming industries. We have to do something about the construction sector. That is the purpose of the measure.

I have previously said that standing still and doing nothing are not solutions. We have to try things out but we must also be focused and be able to measure the cost to other taxpayers of what we are doing. By and large, what we are doing is proving successful. Member may have seen the figures published by the CSO this morning, which indicate that 58,000 net jobs have been created between September 2012 and September 2013. That is more than 1,000 jobs per week. If we can keep that trend up, we will be getting there. However, we must also examine the categories. One of the categories comprises long-term unemployed people with building skills.

As I have already said to Deputy Pearse Doherty, if there is a gap that excludes some deserving group from the benefits of the measure, we will examine it between now and Report Stage. Deputy Boyd Barrett referred to an earlier provision in the section. That is not the extension of a relief; it is a restriction on a relief that previously existed. We are taking out reliefs that were misdirected, as well as providing reliefs that we think are better focused. In regard to the Deputy's plea on empty houses, many of the people who purchase empty houses are getting them very cheaply. They are already benefiting as a result of the recession. In the part of the country with the highest tranche of empty houses per capita, the upper Shannon Basin, most of the houses were built with the benefit of a tax incentive. We want to direct our focus where we can get the biggest social benefit and the highest economic activity. I do not think applying the measure to empty houses and carrying out works that should have been part of the original construction is the way to proceed. I am sympathetic to the case that Deputy Pearse Doherty made regarding special categories of people who need additional accommodation which may not be covered by disability grants. I am prepared to consider the issue, although it is not yet evident to me that such a category exists.